


Usually in Between the Lines

by thedeafwriter



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Alternative Meeting, Fighting AU, John and Sherlock are going to fight, Prompt Fill, boxing au, my first fic with multiple chapters, tags to be updated as it goes on
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-27
Updated: 2015-12-27
Packaged: 2018-05-09 20:25:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5554073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thedeafwriter/pseuds/thedeafwriter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Prompt - a johnlock au where they're both fighters of some sort and Sherlock is renowned for being impossible to hit, it seems like he knows when and where you're going to strike and he can See if you're feinting/bluffing and yeah anyway him and john spar one day and j is like wow ur good and they make a habit of practice with each other and one day j breaks through his defence and pins him down and sherlocks just like omg heart eyes and yeah can u write it witg a focus on what s is thinking/feeling</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sherlock Holmes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt - a johnlock au where they're both fighters of some sort and Sherlock is renowned for being impossible to hit, it seems like he knows when and where you're going to strike and he can See if you're feinting/bluffing and yeah anyway him and john spar one day and j is like wow ur good and they make a habit of practice with each other and one day j breaks through his defence and pins him down and sherlocks just like omg heart eyes and yeah can u write it witg a focus on what s is thinking/feeling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My ever suffering beta- http://fortunatelykeendetective.tumblr.com/

The lights stream down from the corners of the room and overhead, obliterating the view outside the ring. The square ring is a stage and the crowd’s cheers and jeers combine into cacophony.

Inside the ring near its edge a lanky man with purple gloves stands still, arms blocking his face, leaving a gap just wide enough for him to observe the stocky orange-gloved opponent.

_Brian ‘The Brick’ Carter. Cocky, uses height and strength to intimidate opponents,  rarely blocks. Left wrist is weaker, surgery after a fracture when he was ten- no, eleven. Favours his right leg, no current evidence to suggest why. Steps forwardon that leg, will be easy to unbalance. Eyes slightly unfocused; lights causing slight dissociation._

 

Sherlock ‘Perfection’ Holmes smirks at the hulking man and lowers his arms to his side, challenging him with eye contact and a slight chuckle. Brian the Brick takes the bait as have so many before him.Sherlock’s mind slows to a surreal pace. Right leg forward, a step to the side and a blow to the ribs knocking Brian off-balance. Brian stumbles, swings with his left hand. Sherlock blocks, grabs, and twists. Several well-placed jabs to the chest and stomach and Sherlock stands over the groaning body, panting.

Another match won, another day without being hit. Such is the fame and glory of Sherlock Holmes. 

 

For years, the weeks have passed thus; training, barely sleeping, fighting, and winning. Sherlock bears neither bruises nor marks to prove his presence in the ring. Part of his job and reputation depend on this.

Sherlock assumes his opponents are barely even trying. Why fight a man who can see your family in the way your shorts hang off your hips or your childhood accident in the twitch of your shoulder? To win, to beat Perfection Holmes, borders on impossible.

\--

Most people know of his reputation but very few know how he earned it.

 

Sherlock began seeking fights as a teenager, during his years of shooting up 7% cocaine, for a high his normal life failed to deliver.  His mind, drug-slowed as it was, allowed him to be one step ahead of all who met his taunts and hurtful observations with brute force. He’d anticipated their blows and more often than not, had them laid out on the concrete ground before they’d ever made contact.

 

Unbeknownst to Sherlock, during an altercation induced by yet another drunk posh boy who hadn’t taken kindly to Sherlock’s scathing observations, someone else was watching.

A man stepped from the shadows of the alley to offer him a chance at winning fights for a living on the condition that he also fight the drugs.

At that moment Sherlock Holmes became clean and became Perfection.


	2. John Watson

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt - a johnlock au where they're both fighters of some sort and Sherlock is renowned for being impossible to hit, it seems like he knows when and where you're going to strike and he can See if you're feinting/bluffing and yeah anyway him and john spar one day and j is like wow ur good and they make a habit of practice with each other and one day j breaks through his defence and pins him down and sherlocks just like omg heart eyes and yeah can u write it witg a focus on what s is thinking/feeling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My lovely beta - http://fortunatelykeendetective.tumblr.com/

John didn’t have much to watch on telly or have many hobbies to take part in since he’d been invalided home from Afghanistan after only a year in service. He has still been in contact with his friends then so he’s able to lodge in with them until he can afford his own place – it isn’t much, but it has the basics, enough for John to get by. 

He has a job at the local clinic to pass the time by and pay the rent, but there isn’t much going for him, not even his work. Except when he watches Fight Just One, a boxing show where people are matched with boxers considered unbeatable. To John’s knowledge, nobody has beaten the man with errant (luscious? No, John thinks. I’m not gay) dark curls and striking cheekbones. Nobody has managed to even get a punch in, much less land the perfect one to knock that long lean body to the ground. 

Okay, maybe the man – this ‘Perfection Holmes’ – has starred in a couple of John’s dreams since he began watching the weekly series, but that doesn’t mean much. No, it doesn’t. It’s completely normal to dream of doing that… Right?

Anyway, John watches only a few episodes before deciding that it would be best for his health and war-injured shoulder if he does a little boxing. He joins the gym to build up his muscle before joining a boxing class. The teacher praises him from the start, marvelling at his natural fighting ability. John’s just doing what he thinks he has to do to succeed and quickly works up from novice to expert. 

John quits the clinic once he’s offered a job to teaching boxing alongside his trainer. It’s something he enjoys, it gives him purpose. Other people do it to be fit, to be able to protect themselves, or simply for fun. John does it to survive. 

It’s a sunny November afternoon when John finds himself alone with the punching bag, wrist weights on, trying to work out just what a fuckup he could’ve been, maybe still is, but for sure how far he’s come from being the cripple with the bum shoulder. Sweat pours down his face and into his eyes but he pounds on, the mute punching bag on the receiving end of every blow. He can see it in his mind, this alternative reality that could have happened. In the flat that had been offered to him when he came back to London, sitting at a plain desk with a cup of coffee and an apple that he was going to leave uneaten. John could picture himself trying to fill his days with something but getting trapped into a spiralling darkness that he would not be able to fight against. The offer of the quick escape would always be there in the form of his gun, which he would always keep out of sight but inside his mind.

“Hmm.” A deep voice fills the otherwise empty room and John turns around, drops his gloves, and pauses. “Ex-Soldier, slight limp – completely psychosomatic, by the way – older brother to one sibling, most likely sister, and does boxing as a way to relax. You must be the new member, John Watson.”

John straightens his back and looks at the stranger – if he could be considered a stranger to John – standing in the doorway. With a mop of curls on his head and cold analytical eyes, it was definitely Sherlock. Sherlock seemed to be tense, like he was waiting for something unpleasant. 

For his part, Sherlock waits for swears and curses to start, for a look of anger in the shorter man’s eyes.

They never come.

“That’s amazing.”  
There’s a pause after John’s words of admiration.  
“Do you really think so?”  
“Of course.”

John looks back down at his hands and reaches for the gloves beside him, fastening one of his hands inside smoothly and quickly before using his teeth for the other. The silence between them comfortable, like they’ve been friends since forever.

“I know who you are, and you know who I am.” John notes out loud, mainly to himself, eyes trained on the punching bag in front of him. “I could use the practice but nobody hits you. Famous for it, aren’t you?”

John’s baiting him, Sherlock knows. Still, he feels a fiery urgent need to defend his reputation.

“Alright.”


End file.
